Sunday, April 27, 2014

So . . . today I watched - and listened to - the Mormon Tabernacle Choir!!!  What an experience!  Of course, I've heard their CD's and marvelled at them on tv, but actually being in the same room with them was awesome!  Every Sunday at 9:30 a.m., they perform in the Tabernacle for half an hour.  This performance is recorded and televised - can be live-streamed, in fact. At 8:30 a.m., they rehearse the program, so I got their at 8:30 and watched their rehearsal, then the actual performance at 9:30.  For the actual performance, no picture-taking is allowed, and the audience is asked to be as quiet as possible, so that the microphones don't pick up a lot of crowd sound or flashes.That doesn't apply to the rehearsal, however, so that's when I took my pictures!  One of the drivers of the tour van told me that the best seat in the house was in the balcony - so that's where I sat, front row, dead centre - and she was right!  For the actual performance, the tabernacle was packed!

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The Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra!!

The women's section

The men's section

I'm pretty sure I wasn't actually supposed to record this - but oh well! Don't know if it can be seen or heard here!

After the Choir performance, I took another stroll around Temple Square, and went to Brio's restaurant for lunch - finding a place to eat was a challenge - Salt Lake City pretty much closes down on Sunday,

Fountain outside South Temple Centre

Reflecting pool across from the Temple

End view of the Temple

Selfie by the reflecting pool

Busy streets of Salt Lake City on a Sunday

Another view of the hustle and bustle . . . 

"Busy"Sunday brunch in Salt Lake City!  Taken at 12:00 noon.

The model showing the inside of the Temple

This is the statue at the top of the Temple - it's the angel Moroni, who talked to Joseph Smith 

At 2:00 p.m., I came back to the Tabernacle for the Organ Recital - another free concert put on every Sunday.It was awesome - but soo few people attended!  Cool organ - shown off very well by guest organist Ikuko Weller, who played Simon Preston's Alleluyas and Rachmininoff's Vocalise, amongst other pieces. The organ has 206 ranks,11,623 pipes. It was built originally by Joseph H. Ridge in the 1860's, then rebuilt and enlarged in 1948 by the Aolian/Skinner Company of Boston. Before the recital, Ikuko did the famous "pin drop" thing:  dropped a pin into a bowl to show us how audible this is everywhere in the Tabernacle, and how phenomenal the acoustics are!  On my tour yesterday, I discovered that the organ in one of the chapels was built by our own Casavant Freres of Montreal!!